Lehigh County commissioners race draws 14 candidates

At least 14 candidates file nominating petitions, five in District 5 alone.

March 12, 2013|By Samantha Marcus, Of The Morning Call

Nearly half of the candidates running for Lehigh County commissioner hail from the 5th District, where Republican Mike Schware is being targeted by members of both parties.

Overall, at least 14 candidates for commissioner filed their nominating petitions by Tuesday's deadline, according to an unofficial list. Some candidates' petitions may not have been entered yet.

Five seats on the nine-member board will be on the ballot. One incumbent, Democrat Dan McCarthy, is not running for re-election.

District 5 has shaped up to be the most hotly contested seat. Schware has pushed for more deliberative decision-making and typically votes with the board's conservative bloc. He was appointed in 2012 to replace Glenn Eckhart and is a lifelong Allentown resident and a certified public accountant.

Schware's challengers cited his record on quality-of-life issues during his year on the board. Nathan Brown, a Republican Emmaus councilman, said he was prompted to run after the board threatened Green Future Fund grants, several of which were directed toward District 5 municipalities.

Norma Cusick, also a Republican, has served on the Salisbury Township School Board, the Lehigh County Authority, Allentown Public Library Board of Directors and as a township commissioner. In her announcement, Cusick said she's disappointed with the district's representation on the board. Republican Kevin Ryan is also running.

Wesley Barret and Stephen Walters are competing for the Democratic nomination.

"When you're working for your constituents' interests, you really don't have time to be distracted by the ideological games going on in Washington," Barrett, a disc jockey and Emmaus councilman, said in a statement. "This used to be the standard approach for Lehigh County government."

Walters could not be reached for comment.

In District 1, Republican incumbent Tom Creighton is clear in the primary but faces a challenge from Democrat Bill Leiner Jr.

Creighton joined the board in 2010. He's a rare swing vote who most often votes with the conservative budget reform slate. He is a network engineer for the Caldwell-West Caldwell School District in New Jersey.

Leiner is a member of Coplay Borough Council and a former Coplay mayor. He was a Lehigh County commissioner from 2008-10. Leiner said in a statement that he's running because he disagrees with the direction of the board.

"The ideological tone of the board's majority has hampered the county," Leiner said. He is a registered nurse and director of a mental health center in Quakertown.

In District 2, Scott Aquila is challenging Republican incumbent Percy Dougherty from the right. In a statement, Aquila aligns himself with the board's conservative reform slate.

Aquila is an associate dean at Lehigh Carbon Community College. He's secretary of the Lehigh County Republican Party.

Dougherty is a retired Kutztown University professor who taught environmental studies. He's active in the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania. As one of the board's more moderate members, he has occasionally voted with the Democrats, most notably on the divisive 2013 budget.

In a statement, Dougherty said that although he's a fiscal conservative, "cuts cannot be made that impact the quality of life that we enjoy in Lehigh County."

A Democrat who filed for the District 2 seat, Susan Ellis Wild, could not be reached for comment.

The winner of the District 3 primary could be unopposed in the general election. Incumbent David Jones, a Democrat and an ordained minister, has a primary challenger, Juan Camacho, an attorney with Fries Law Office in Allentown.

"Some members of the county Board of Commissioners are dismantling our communities, frustrating our opportunities and stifling our vision," Camacho said in a statement.

Democrat Geoff Brace is the heir apparent to District 4's outgoing commissioner, McCarthy. Brace is state Rep. Mike Schlossberg's legislative assistant and once held the same role in former state Rep. Jennifer Mann's office. The Allentown resident ran for county commissioner in 2011 and lost.